Clean Air Act Digest, 7.15.11

UPDATES Updates: House: Appropriations Committee: This past Tuesday, the House Appropriations Committee approved the FY2012 Environment and Interior appropriations bill.   The base bill contained dozens of policy riders that would put our nation’s air and water at risk; during the mark up, the bill was further loaded down by amendments that will imperil the quality [...]

Clean Air Act Digest, 5.13.11

UPDATES Updates: The Obama Administration is poised to complete the reconsideration of the ozone health standards by late July.  On May 13, 13 leading health groups sent a letter to the President urging him to support science-based standards that will protect public health. The respected firm the Analyst Group issued a report authored by Sue [...]

Clean Air Act Digest, 4.15.11

UPDATES Continuing Resolution: Last Friday night, after weeks of negotiations and a near shutdown of the government, Congressional leaders reached a deal on the Continuing Resolution (CR) to fund the government until Sept 30, 2011. In a significant victory clean air supporters beat back another attempt to block clean air standards when House budget negotiators [...]

Climate Action Hotline, 3.21.11

Peter Bahouth, Executive Director March 21, 2011 Climate Action Hotline Under the guise of protecting small businesses, higher gas prices and continued high unemployment numbers, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) pushed to prevent the Environmental Protection Agency from moving forward on new pollution regulations, but failed to get to a vote Thursday, after days [...]

Clean Air Act Digest, 2.23.11

UPDATES 1. House Spending Bill: On February 19 the House of Representatives passed their FY11 spending bill (H.R. 1) by a vote of 235-189. Upon introduction the bill blocked the EPA’s ability to address dangerous carbon pollution and included budget cuts that would cripple critical programs to protect public health. Additionally, several amendments were passed [...]

Narrow Energy Bills Introduced in House and Senate

Goals: Make Deep Ocean Drilling Safer; Improve Energy Efficiency House and Senate Democrats on Tuesday introduced separate energy proposals that are principally concerned with limiting the hazards of deep ocean energy exploration and production, and also contain modest additional measures to strengthen energy efficiency programs and expand the use of natural gas as a fuel [...]

Call Your Senator for the Climate’s Sake

The environmental group 1Sky is asking supporters of strong climate legislation to make next Tuesday, January 12th, a national call-in day for the climate. Callers are encouraged to ask their Senators to take action on a climate bill and also to vote “no” on limiting the EPA’s power to regulate greenhouse gases under the proposed [...]

Bill Seeks to Spur Renewable Energy Development on Private Land

On Thursday, Senators Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) and Jeff Merkley (D-OR) introduced the Renewable Incentive Act (S 2899) to expand a grant program that was the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 aimed at keeping the renewable energy section strong through the economic crisis. That program, set to expire in 2010, helps renewable energy developers [...]

“Immediate Operational Effect”: Climate Action Hotline, Dec. 1

December 2, 2009 The countdown to Copenhagen began in earnest over the last week as the U.S., China, and India announced new emissions targets and other actions in a coordinated campaign to heighten expectations about reaching a global climate agreement that, in President Obama’s words, have “immediate operational effect.” Meanwhile, opponents to climate action coordinated [...]